Estes Park Music Festival Sounds of Summer season finale Monday

By Nancy Stevens

Special to the Trail-Gazette

Posted:
07/31/2013 01:36:00 PM MDT

Courtney Lewis

A spectacular program awaits the audience for the Music Festival Sounds of Summer 2013 Season Finale on Monday, Aug 5. Doors open at 7 p.m. with the performance set to get underway at 7:30 p.m. in the Stanley Hotel Concert Hall. The audience will welcome guest conductor, Courtney Lewis and the Colorado Music Festival Concert Master Calin Lupanu who will be performing with the CMF Chamber Orchestra. This concert is in Memory of Music Festival Patron Helen Swartout.

Colin Lupanu

Lewis, who became the Minnesota Orchestra's associate conductor in September 2010 after one year as assistant conductor, has worked with orchestras and chamber ensembles from London to Los Angeles to Venezuela, earning recognition as one of today's top emerging conductors. Lewis is founding music director of Boston's acclaimed Discovery Ensemble, a chamber orchestra with the mission of introducing inner-city school children to classical music while bringing new and unusual repertoire to established concert audiences. Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Lewis attended the University of Cambridge, where he studied composition with Robin Holloway and clarinet with Dame Thea King, graduating at the top of his year with starred first class honors.

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After completing a master's degree with a focus on the late music of György Ligeti, he attended the Royal Northern College of Music, where his teachers included Sir Mark Elder and Clark Rundell. In 2009 he completed a two-year tenure as Zander Fellow with the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, a prestigious conducting apprenticeship under the ensemble's music director, Benjamin Zander. We are honored to welcome guest conductor Courtney Lewis.

Lupanu has been Concertmaster of the Colorado Music Festival since 2004. Born in Timisoaram, Romania, violinist Lupanu serves as Concertmaster of the Charlotte Symphony during the regular winter season. Prior to coming to the Charlotte Symphony, he served as assistant Concertmaster of the Green Bay Symphony Orchestra, Concertmaster of the Evansville Philharmonic, principal player in the Alabama Symphony, and Concertmaster of the West Virginia Symphony.

The Beethoven selections for the evening's program are uniquely "Beethovenian". The Consecration of the House, Op.124 is a work composed by Beethoven in September 1822. It was commissioned by Carl Friedrich Henseler, the Director of Viennas' new Theatre in der Josefstat and first performed at the theatre's opening on Oct. 2, 1822. It was the first work Beethoven wrote after his revival of studying the works of J.S. Bach and Handel, and bears their influence. In Leonore Overture No. 3 in C Major, Op.72b, there are no fewer than four separate overtures for Beethoven's opera Fidelio. He spent more than a decade of his life writing, revising and reworking his only opera.

In the first two decades of the 20th century, Schreker, composer of Chamber Symphony, was regarded as a composer destined to take his place among the immortals. He was among the most eminent operatic composers of his time. Schreker's fame and influence were at their peak during the early years of the Weimer Republic when he was the most performed living opera composer after Richard Strauss. The decline of his artistic fortunes began with the mixed reception given to Irrelohe (Cologne, 1924) and the failure of Der singende Teufel (Berlin, 1928). Political developments and the spread of anti-Semitism were also contributory factors, both of which heralded the end of Schreker's career. In his lifetime he went from being hailed as the future of German opera to being considered irrelevant as a composer and marginalized as an educator. But, after decades in obscurity, Schreker has begun to enjoy a considerable revival in reputation in the German-speaking world and in the United States. (some program notes by Matthew Naughton. The Chamber Symphony remains Schreker's most frequently performed work today.

Concerto No. 5 in A major for Violin K. 219 , more often referred to by the nickname the "Turkish" , will be brilliantly performed by CMF Concertmaster Calin Lupanu. Mozart wrote five violin concertos in Salzburg between April and December in 1775 and then never wrote another one the rest of his life. This violin concerto premiered during the holiday season of that year.

Join the Estes Park Music Festival Season Finale at the historic Stanley Hotel for this exceptional program and to honor the memory of Music Patron Helen Swartout.

Single Tickets $30. Check or cash only. Tickets are available at the door or in advance at Macdonald Book Shop (152 E. Elkhorn Ave., Estes Park) or our business office located at Hobert Office Services (1140 Manford Avenue, Suite A, Estes Park) (970) 586-9519. As always all of our concerts are offered free to students and children. To learn more about Music Festival concerts and events, visit our web site at estesparkmusicfestival. org or join our e mail at epmfinfo2@yahoo.com.We are also listed on Facebook.

The Music Festival will begin its Winter Series on Nov. 3, most Sunday afternoons from 2 to 3:15 p.m. Enjoy an eclectic mix of chorale, instrumental and solo performances at the beautiful historic Stanley Hotel.

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